


The Victors

by Heylir



Category: Widdershins (Webcomic)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-17
Updated: 2017-09-17
Packaged: 2018-12-30 14:07:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12110382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Heylir/pseuds/Heylir
Summary: Some scars last a lifetime. Or don't they?Major spoilers for the storyline of Dominik Voss and some spoilers for "Curtain Call".





	The Victors

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [Победители](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11775792) by [Heylir](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Heylir/pseuds/Heylir). 



> It's a translation made by the author of the fanfic; **Thren** was a lot of help in editing it, and I am very grateful to her.
> 
> The story takes place in supposed future after the Deadly Sins arch has finished. 
> 
> The author was inspired by Ben's answer on this page: <http://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/character-questions-3/>.
> 
>  **NB.** Please be aware that for the actual text is an author's translation, so the author ~~has written as she damned please~~ has taken a liberty to make sometimes small changes in it for achieving greater expressiveness of the presentation.

_...for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle..._

 

    "Ben, look here," Wolfe entered his room. "Dominik has sent me a letter."  
    Benjamin looked up from his book.  
    "And what does it say?" he asked, in a tone of a complete indifference.  
    "He is going to visit us in few days and bring my violin along."  
    "That'll make O'Malley happy," said Ben with a slight emphasis on the name as if he asked, "Why are you telling **me** about this?"  
    Wolfe seemed to hear this silent question.  
    "I want to consult with you, my friend."  
    "About your violin?"  
    "About Dominik. Do you think it is possible to fix his eye?"  
    Ben shrugged, "I never gave it a thought. I'm not a medic, I only took a basic college course of healing magic. Let him see specialists."  
    "Specialists will ask dangerous questions," Wolfe said quietly.  
    Ben added in understanding, "And they can turn out to be law-abiding citizens. More so than we are, I mean."  
    "Ben!" exclaimed Wolfe, his voice gently reproaching.  
    He shook his head, "I'll give a theoretical opinion, based on my reading about the Deadly Sins. If he traded his human eye for the magical one, it can't be helped."  
    "He did not," Wolfe objected. "I saw... there, within the circle of Wrath... when Dominik overcame Envy's possession, it made his eyes change back from green to human ones. And both were intact."  
    Ben became interested, unwillingly, "Then his eye was injured as the connection between it, Envy and the glass thing was broken. With your gunshot."  
    "I supposed so," nodded Wolfe.  
    "I hope you don't feel guilty," Ben raised his brows.  
    "I do not," Wolfe replied calmly. "There was only one way out, for Dominik as well as for us. But I wish to help him if it is possible." Wolfe looked at Ben inquiringly.  
    "I never learned about anything like this," he said reluctantly. "Neither in practice nor in theory. My books on the subject are gone, my money's tight, my library quota's almost used up..." but Wolfe's look made the list of problems void, somehow. Ben sighed and drummed his fingers on the table. "I'll have to check something, directly on him."  
    Wolfe beamed, "If there is anything I can do, just tell me."  
    "Maybe there is," Ben frowned. "But I can't promise anything."  
  
    Voss, who was talking with Wolfe in German, saw Ben coming in and stopped abruptly in mid-sentence. There was an awkward silence as Voss and Thackerey apparently couldn't decide whether and in which way they should greet each other.  
    Wolfe broke the silence hastily.  
    "Dominik and I have talked it over," he said to Ben. "He wants to try."  
    Ben nodded without a word and began to draw on the floor a magic circle sized for two people. Having it done, he waved his hand to Voss:  
    "Come here." He didn't know how much Voss had improved his English and tried to use simple words. Talking with him through Wolfe all the time would be inconvenient.  
    Voss entered the circle and only then Ben recalled about their height difference.  
    "Bend your head," Ben showed how much and Voss obeyed. His hair from the left side fell at once over his injured eye, but Voss brushed it back before Ben told him to do so. "That's right. Now put your hand over your right eye and stay this way."  
    Ben stretched his hand. " _Phasmia parvus..._ " he began the spell and there appeared a small flame on his palm. He raised his hand slowly, moved it into the blind eye's "line of vision" and drew a little figure-eight with the light on his palm. Then he pulled his hand back just as slowly and finished the spell. The flame was gone.  
    "It's over," he said to Voss. "You may open your eye. Did you see anything?"  
    "A light. Little one." Voss showed the size of the flame with his fingers. "It moved. In this way." Voss drew a figure-eight with a finger.  
    Ben nodded indifferently.  
    "Residual sensibility to magic," he told Wolfe. "I thought so."  
    "Is it good news?"  
    "Partly good. Without that, I wouldn't try at all. But there's still no guarantees. If he's ready to take that risk..."  
    "A risk of what?" said Wolfe, concerned. "What can happen in the worst case?"  
    "Irreversible damage to the eye. I don't think it's going to happen, but there is a chance of it, as low as the one of its self-recovery. That's also unlikely, but possible."  
    Wolfe spoke to Voss in German. The latter listened in silence and said in English at last: "I want to take the risk".  
    "I won't take any complaints afterwards," Ben warned him dryly and added to Wolfe: "But let's keep it our little secret. It's too close to healing magic, I don't want to lose my license."  
    "Whatever you say, Ben," promised Wolfe.  
    "Then wait for me there," Benjamin went back to his room.  
  
    Making preparations for summoning was simple, but at the first words of the spell, Ben's heart beat a bit faster. It wasn't fear of failure, he had nothing to be afraid of, it was curiosity mixed with anticipation of something new.  
    Having read the spell, Ben tensed a little as he waited. The spirit had to appear unless the conduit caused problems. However, for this occasion, he had a plan B.  
    But the spirit appeared. It had the form of a woman, middle-aged, though quite attractive. Its peaceful light washed away Ben's tension completely. Once again he felt nothing except the keen interest of research.  
    "I'm glad of your summon, kind man," she smiled. "I am called in your world less often than I'd want to."  
    It was an uncommon greeting, but nothing less than a cannon-ball could derail Benjamin's thought-out plan. The next step in it was an offering. Ben stood up, pulled out from his breast pocket a sheet of paper written in his hand and gave it to the woman.  
    "I'm going to make the donation tonight," he promised.  
    The woman examined the paper without a word and Ben began to worry.  
    "If it isn't enough, I can increase the sum..." he said in embarrassment, "but I'm now low on funds, my house's burned, and..."  
    The woman waved her hand to stop him.  
    "It only makes your gift more valuable," she said gently. "But before that, tell me what you summoned me for."  
    She didn't give the usual answer, it wasn't supposed to go this way, first an offering to be accepted, then a request to be made. But Ben didn't want to argue with the spirit. Something told him that it was better to let her have it her way. Was it that voice of intuition his teachers had always demanded he listen to? Without any result, of course.  
    "I seek a way of helping a man with impaired vision."  
    "Spirits don't heal injuries of the body," the woman said.  
    "I know," Ben said it and bit his tongue at once; while informality is a good thing, impoliteness isn't. "I'm sorry. It's a special case. That man... his name's Voss... he made a deal with a spirit. After it had been broken, he went blind in one eye."  
    "Was it a deal with one of the Dreadful Brethren?"  
    Ben had never heard this term before, but he had a good guess whom the spirit meant.  
    "Yes, it's Envy. It split itself among the conduit and Voss's eye, giving him the power to use it to take others' abilities. Later the conduit was destroyed. As a result, Envy got free, the stolen abilities went back to their owners, and the eye lost vision."  
    "How long had he been using Envy's power?"  
    "For several years."  
    "Did he destroy the conduit himself?"  
    "No, but he informed the man who did. It wasn't me," added Benjamin, just in a case.  
    "Did he repent of this deal?"  
    Ben moved his shoulders, hardly noticeably, to express his disapproval of the question. It was O'Malley who could see souls of others, not him. But O'Malley wasn't here, as he hadn't been near the Royal Theatre. It was their decision to make, and Wolfe had made the right one, like he always did.  
    "When Envy proposed this offer to him again, he refused it," Ben told what he knew for sure.  
    "It's a very sad story," the woman sighed.  
    "And his part of it isn't the saddest one", Ben said quietly, almost to himself.  
    But the woman seemed to hear his comment.  
    "Why did you summon me, wizard?"  
    Ben noted the changes to form of address and the question's wording. Well, he didn't meet before spirits demanding explanations from its summoners, but the usual protocol of summoning went to the Fourth Anchor already from her first words.  
    "I read in the books that you and Envy are..." he searched for the word, "adversaries. So I thought..."  
    "Books tell the truth," the woman smiled. "But it isn't that which I ask about. Why do you want to help this man?"  
    A non-standard situation, a non-standard solution. But you must tell summoned spirits the truth or nothing, Ben did know that. So he said the truth, for lack of a better alternative, "I've been asked to by my friend. It's him who destroyed Envy's conduit." The woman stayed silent. "Is that not good?" he inquired with concern.  
    "If it were so, you wouldn't be able to summon me. But it's not **good** enough. What you need here is an energy flow directed to that man."  
    "Ah," Ben understood, "if that's the problem, we can always..."  
    But the woman interrupted him, "Did he wrong you?"  
    Involuntarily Ben touched his hair where his "grandad's ponytail" had once been.  
    "A little. Less than others."  
    "Are you angry at him?"  
    "No." He said the truth. That imposing, self-assured Voss, whose airs set Ben's teeth on edge, no longer existed. Nor did Envy's puppet that took O'Malley's sight. And that dishevelled, knocked-to-the-ground Voss, who even didn't try to get up and struggled with the English words as he stubbornly insisted that he was there to help, that Voss didn't make Ben feel anything except...  
    "Are you envious of him?" the woman asked quietly.  
    "No!" exclaimed Benjamin, sincerely indignant. But indignation was overcome by confusion at once, and he dropped his head, embarrassed. " _Discedere, phasmia..._ " the first words of the desummoning spell got out by themselves, but Ben stopped them in time. His lips closed firmly, he put his fingers deep into his new-cut hair and stayed silent.  
    "The Dreadful Brethren are terrible," the woman said sympathetically.  
    "I know," Benjamin replied, in a muffled voice. He could recall a disgusting giant slimeball with its gaping mouths, his burning house in flames, people captured by mirrors... but he recalled a soft green paw that ruffled up his hair and persuasive whispering of the words he had heard so often. They had sounded inside his head in voices of his teachers, parents, siblings, even O'Malley sometimes, but most often it had been his own voice. "Who are you?.. What can you do?.. So commonplace, ordinary, mediocre..."  
    And there was poisonous green mist that filled up his head and made him forget everything except himself and his ambitions: the threat to the city, his duty of a wizard... and his friends in the coming danger. "We are well, thanks to Dominik!"  
    "He fought back," Benjamin said in a very low voice. "He saved Wolfe, distracted Envy and gave Vee a chance to... he broke a magical string, and I... all this time I was... I did nothing at all! They could have been killed, through my failing! Because I was so... because of my weakness!"  
    The spirit's hand squeezed his shoulder, carefully and tight, in the way one embraces their helpless friend to carry him away from danger.  
    "Every man is weak, each in his own way," she said gently. "It's hard for human beings to resist spirits, such is our mutual nature. But men have their own strength."  
    "I know," Ben looked up, and there was a stubborn expression on his face, the same look a young 'Benji' had worn when tackling the climbing rope back at school, and the same look the student Thackerey had entered his exams for magical improvisation with. "People can fight their weaknesses. It's our strength."  
    "It is," the woman agreed thoughtfully. "And each of you has victories and defeats of their own. Before that man overcame Envy, he had been serving it faithfully for years. These were years of doing evil. Would you like to be in his place?"  
    Ben shook his head, even replying in words to this question seemed unthinkable.  
    "There's no man who can win this battle all the time. Some lose it only at the limit of their powers, other do before that moment comes. And when it happens, there's nothing that can be done, except one thing. One can remember that men are neither perfect nor all-powerful; accept that, and forgive. Everyone, including oneself. It's your strength, too, kind man. The one the Dreadful Brethren can't do anything with."  
    Benjamin blinked and said nothing. He just took off his glasses and sat on the floor, clasping his knees and staring into the wall of the magic circle. The world around him lost its clarity, the contours got blurred, there was nothing unambiguous left... and only the light of the spirit remained the unmistakable compass.  
    As Ben stood up at last, his face was so serene that one would hardly recognize him. Or maybe it was due to the lack of his glasses.  
    "I wish to help Voss," he said firmly. "For his own sake."  
    The woman's light flashed brightly.  
    " _Recipiaro donum_ ," she announced. "Now the rest depends only on him. Let him come here."  
    Benjamin recovered his usual matter-of-fact manner. He put on his glasses and asked:  
    "Should I be here with him?"  
    "No, but it would be best if you and your friend stayed nearby."  
    Ben nodded and left the circle.  
  
    When Ben entered the other room, he made out his own name amidst the stream of German words.  
    "Gossiping?" he frowned.  
    "I am telling Dominik of our adventures," Wolfe smiled.  
    "Tell him about the violin recital before Wrath," suggested Ben.  
    "I know about it already," Voss said suddenly, in English. "I heard it." Wolfe turned to Voss, surprised. He explained, "I didn't mean to, I was just near the jail then."  
    Ben looked doubtful, but chose to drop the subject, "Are you still sure you want to try?" Voss nodded. "Then go there, inside the circle. We'll be waiting here. You'll meet a spirit there, it may ask you about some things. Tell the truth, be polite..."  
    "And choose my words carefully?" Voss seemed to take the hint.  
    "No, that's unnecessary. Trapping people is the _modus_... the way of sins. Above all, don't be afraid of anything. If you change your mind before the process starts, just leave the circle. But after the beginning, don't try to interrupt it yourself. Just cry out, if needed, I'll hear you."  
  
    Unlike Thackerey the wizard, Voss had contacted only one spirit, but this contact had been a very long and close one. He hardly remembered his feelings about Envy back before they had given way to hopeless terror and despair. Had he really seen THAT as his... companion at least, if not his friend? But he had seen Wolfe as his enemy, then. And only when the spirit of Envy took his mind by force, had his despair grown into hatred and the will to resist. Now, even with the Deadly Sins banned from the human world, Voss still kept in mind that you shouldn't listen to sins, whatever they're trying to do: flatter, threaten or make you feel guilty. Whether they're telling lies or the truth, it's all the same.  
    Though it didn't matter now. Voss felt terror before Deadlies, not other spirits. Really it was Anchors that he feared most, with his legs and whole body getting weak at the thought. The fear was stupid, Voss realised that, but he couldn't even make himself go for a walk in the Park. He would not enter an Anchor, neither under threat of death nor for any worldly goods. Nothing short of turning the last three years into a bad dream.  
    But they weren't a dream, his left eye was the proof of that. And next to that, what had Voss to be afraid of?  
    The vision of the radiant woman didn't make him feel at ease as it had Thackerey, on the contrary, Voss sensed some odd tension. It reminded him of Wolfe, but unlike him, the woman wasn't smiling.  
    "You were a servant of Envy," she said.  
    "I was." This "was" didn't make Voss feel anything, neither pride nor shame. He expected questions about his eye, but the woman asked about something else.  
    "Do you think you deserve to be healed?"  
     _Tell the truth..._  
    "I don't," said Voss, without hesitation.  
    "But do you want to be healed?"  
    "I do," Voss didn't see it as a contradiction, but he wouldn't try to explain this notion to the spirit.  
    "Why?"  
     _Be polite..._  
    "Two eyes see better than one. And my eye-patch is too conspicuous." The woman stayed silent as if she waited for the real answer. He offered a sounder reason: "Wolfe wants me to. He feels guilty about this, I think. I don't want that."  
    The woman smiled a little.  
    "And what about yourself?" She stared at him, he met her eyes and told her what he wouldn't tell even Wolfe. Or maybe, Wolfe in particular.  
    "I want to know if it's possible."  
    The woman sighed, "You want to know who are more powerful, we or they? It depends only on you. All of you. You personally, too."  
    "I understand that, now," Voss nodded. "It is why I want to know... about myself."  
    The woman didn't inquire for clarification, just asked, "Aren't you afraid?"  
     _Tell the truth... Don't be afraid..._  
    "I am. But I want to know, no matter what."  
    "Be it as you wish," the woman put her hand on his shoulder, and pleasant warmth went through Voss' body. As if some friend had helped him up off the frozen ground, tucked a fur jacket around him and given him a hot drink. This warmth melted away the ice wall within that screened Voss' past from him. And before it could frighten him, the spirit raised her other hand and a beam of bright light pierced his sightless eye.  
    It felt like being knocked down by a tidal wave and drowned in it. He couldn't resist, and this light stirred up to the surface what Voss had tried to forget so hard. Stinging resentment against the world for his own unworthiness, his memory of those three years, a sense of inexpiable guilt... and the realisation that there wouldn't be anything good in his life anymore, because there was no place for him among good people and never, never, never more... He clenched his teeth to keep from screaming, as the light flooded him inside and set on fire every wound and every scratch of his soul. He remembered that he could call out to Thackerey and it would be over, but he stayed silent. Not because of pride or shame, he just knew that this light was his only hope, and if he rejected it then all would remain the same, hopeless, joyless, painful, until his very death... And this light was no stranger to him, Voss remembered it leading and rescuing in pitch-darkness, even if it killed him now, it would be better than a life without it. So Voss held stubbornly on, clenching his teeth.  
  
    "Maybe, it would be better if you go with him," said Wolfe, concerned.  
    "No," Ben shook his head. "It wouldn't, trust me. There's nothing more I can do. Don't worry, it will be... no worse than it was."  
    They remained silent until Benjamin held up his finger.  
    "It has begun," he said.  
    "Do you feel it from here?"  
    "It's my summon, and we're close to it," an unusual, surprised smile of joy slowly appeared on Ben's face. "Well, I never! The intensity of the energy flow, it's increasing at such a high rate. I can't believe... "He looked at Wolfe. "Don't you feel anything?"  
    Wolfe spread his hands wide, "Nothing special."  
    Ben went on "listening", with the same unusual-for-him expression of his face. At one moment he bit his lip and frowned, but already at next one breathed a sigh of relief.  
    "Now," he said a few seconds later. "It's over. You may go to him."  
    "And you?"  
    "I'll come... later. For desummoning and cleaning."  
  
    Voss sat down within the circle, his face buried in his hands. Wolfe, paying no attention to the spirit, touched his shoulder.  
    "Dominik, are you all right?"  
    "Yes," Voss replied, in a muffled voice. He moved his hands away from his face and glanced up at Wolfe. Both of his eyes looked the same now: both had an iris and pupil, both were red and swollen.  
    "Did it hurt that badly?"  
    "Badly?" echoed Voss. "No, it hurt... but it doesn't matter, now. Thank you," he said to the woman.  
    "A pleasure to meet you," Wolfe realized its presence at last, and the woman smiled at him.  
    "We're bound by the summons of man," she said to Voss. "Thank the one who summoned me, and the one who asked him to."  
    "Thanks," Voss said to a slightly embarrassed Wolfe. "C'mon, it's not like I couldn't guess you were behind this."  
    "Now do stand up," Wolfe held out his hand to Voss and smiled. "Need help?"  
    "No, I can do it," he smiled back and easily rose to his feet. But Wolfe still kept his hand outstretched, and after a moment of delay, Voss shook it. Wolfe beamed.  
    "I am thankful, too," he said to the spirit. She smiled gently, shook her head, but said only, "Let the wizard come here, I've overstayed my welcome."  
  
    "Well..?" Ben asked when they left the magic circle.  
    "Perfectly well!" Wolfe replied. "The spirit is waiting for its desummoning."  
    Ben was about to enter the circle from the other side, but Voss, in a few strides, intercepted him.  
    "Thank you," he said.  
    "That's all right," Thackerey answered, after some thinking.


End file.
